Archive for the ‘Matta’ Category

At least 22 militants and three soldiers were killed in clashes in northwest Pakistan, where the military is waging a fierce battle with Taliban-linked militants, officials said Sunday.

AFP
Fifteen militants and three soldiers were killed late Saturday in the scenic Swat valley during an ongoing army operation against fighters loyal to pro-Taliban cleric Maulana Fazlullah, a senior military official told AFP.

Pakistani helicopter gunships and artillery pounded militant positions in Matta and Kabal districts, both Fazlullah strongholds, the official added, on condition of anonymity.

The mountainous Swat valley was until last year a popular tourist destination where many Pakistani city dwellers went for their annual holidays and featured Pakistan’s only ski resort.

But it has since been turned into a battleground since Fazlullah, who has links to Pakistan’s Taliban movement, launched a violent campaign for Islamic Sharia law.

Pakistani troops on patrol in the troubled Bajaur region in September. At least 22 militants and three soldiers were killed in clashes in northwest Pakistan, where the military is waging a fierce battle with Taliban-linked militants, officials said Sunday.(AFP/Pool/File/Aamir Qureshi)

Dear Sir, I hope you and your team at the Peace and Freedom will be alright. Some interestings events have been taking place in tribal areas.

These events give a clear indication that now the government of Pakistan at last decided to finish Taliban and terrorists. It is not yet clear after Taliban and terrorists to the whom the areas will be given.

A change of governor, the controlling authorities has also taken place.

According to reports, security forces resumed artillery fire on miscreants’ hideouts in the Matta and Kabal areas of Swat, as there were reports that rebel cleric Maulana Fazlullah may have been killed in the shelling.

A Daily Times Monitoring report quoted Geo News as saying that rumours about Fazlullah’s death arose following the security forces’ shelling of rebel hideouts, but neither security officials nor Taliban leaders confirmed them.

Also on Tuesday, security forces targeted militant positions in Piochar and Ocharaee Sar in Swat. The troops also arrested a paramedic, Hilal Ahmad, on charges of providing first-aid to militants.

Meanwhile, official sources told Daily Times that more than 500 miscreants – some of them close confidantes of Fazlullah’s and would-be suicide bombers – had been arrested by security forces since the launching of the operation in the valley. The sources said the detainees were being investigated at different locations and some of them had provided key information to interrogators. Meanwhile, the government said its writ had been restored in 90 percent of Swat, adding that Kabal was on high alert following a suicide bombing on Sunday. Curfew was also in place in areas between Baryam Bridge and Venai on Tuesday.

Report from Wana, the headquarter of Waziristan said that smultaneous attacks on the offices of pro-government peace committees supporting commander Maulvi Nazir will lead to “serious consequences” for Baitullah Mehsud, officials and tribal elders said. Baitullah is being chased by the government for his alleged involvement in the assassination of former premier Benazir Bhutto.

“Anyone who is from the Mehsud tribe is leaving Wana following the late Sunday night attacks in which ten comrades of Maulvi Nazir were killed,” the officials told Daily Times.

“The current situation will help the government and endanger Baitullah Mehsud’s life,” the officials said. Maulvi Nazir’s men retaliated and killed a Mehsud Talib and captured four others hours after the attacks. A Mehsud tribesman said that there was tense situation for non-Wazir residents in Wana where announcements were being made via loudspeaker-mounted vehicles asking the Mehsuds to “leave the Wana soil.”

Most Ahmedzai Wazirs believe the attacks were orchestrated by Baitullah Mehsud and that Maulvi Nazir people can retaliate,” he said.

Separately, Nazir summoned a meeting of elders of his clan on Wednesday to discuss the situation after the killings, his aides told AFP. The Mehsud tribe also held a meeting and decided to send a delegation for talks with aides of Baitullah Mehsud, local administration official Khaista Rehman said.

Dear Sir, at the moment the situation is very critical and tense. Any mishandling may lead to bloodshed and more killing.

Please pray for us. Situation in Bajaur Agency is normal to some extent, but there is tension as the people are expecting full-scale operation against the militants.

“Go to every corner of Pakistan and give the message that this is the time to sacrifice,” Chaudhry, who is under virtual house arrest, told lawyers by mobile phone Tuesday. “The day will come when you’ll see the constitution supreme and no dictatorship for a long time.” Pakistan‘s deposed chief justice called on lawyers nationwide to defy police and protest President Gen. Pervez Musharraf‘s imposition of emergency rule, while the Cabinet debated whether to delay parliamentary elections by as much as three months, a minister said.

In the lawless northwest, Islamic militants seized a town from outnumbered security forces who surrendered without a fight.

Musharraf, who took power in a 1999 coup, said over the weekend he was declaring a state of emergency to respond to a growing Islamic militant threat. He suspended the constitution, put a stranglehold on the media and granted sweeping powers to authorities to crush dissent. Thousands of people have been rounded up and thrown in jail.

In the Swat valley near the Afghan border — a focus of a wave of militant violence — about two dozen police officers and several troops offered no resistance to militants who seized three police stations and a military post in and around the town of Matta.